Bill Cunningham - first of the great NZ locks
For a player who gained such fame as possibly the best of those men who locked New Zealand's 2-3-2 scrum, Bill Cunningham had none of the helping hands that so many other players enjoyed.
His progress was a laboured step-by-step development. But as the steps got steeper, his suitability for holding the All Blacks scrum together was realised. The lock was the central figure of New Zealand's unique seven-man scrum, locking the combination into a force capable of coping against eight opponents.
Bill Cunningham - The Sportsman pic
Because of his size as a youth, he was denied the chance to play junior rugby, and he learnt his craft against much older players. When starting, Cunningham played at halfback for Raglan on the Waikato coast in 1893. It was actual country rugby, and it was nothing unusual for players to ride their horses across rugged terrain for 25 miles to get a game.
They sometimes played two games a day to make the most of their chances. After his first season, he played for Waingaro, travelling with them to Hamilton to be beaten 46-3 in one game.
Another move in the next season saw him play for Waitekauri in the Ohinemuri Union, sharing them winning their club championship in consecutive years.
By 1898, Cunningham moved to Thames, an area buzzing with talent and a significant force in the game. That saw him win a place with Auckland in 1898. Despite having yet to play in the position, he was chosen as a lock.
His selection was timely as Auckland became a team of considerable strength on the New Zealand scene. Having played every game for the side in 1900, Cunningham made the New Zealand side that played New South Wales in 1901.
The travel commitments from Thames proved too much, and he joined the City Club in Auckland in 1902, playing alongside All Blacks like George Smith, George Nicholson, George 'Toiler' Tyler and Opae Asher. He played for the North Island in the same season and was one of the players who achieved a feat unique in New Zealand rugby. Because of its success, the NZ Rugby Union had decided Auckland should be the first team awarded the Ranfurly Shield, and Cunningham was one of the group who took the Shield back to Auckland on the train after it was presented following the inter-island game.
Having learned that his place in the Auckland team of 1903 was assured, he played his club rugby in Waihi, and during his stay, he was convinced to play in an inter-pub game, trying to keep out of trouble by playing as a wing three-quarter. Tempting the fates, he suffered a knee injury that kept him in hospital for six weeks.
It proved the only time he sustained an injury in rugby that caused him to lose a day's work during the 20 years of his career.
The 1904 season was mixed. Auckland lost the Ranfurly Shield to Wellington but beat the touring British team 11-0, one of the few games in which Cunningham scored a try.
When Dave Gallaher's 1905-06 touring team was selected, Cunningham was overlooked for the locking role when Canterbury's Fred Newton got the job. However, before the 1905-06 team left for their tour of Britain, Ireland and France, they had a short tour of Australia, playing a game against Auckland ahead of their brief visit. The home team played without two of their key members who were in the All Blacks, wing George Smith and forward Charlie Seeling, and lost 9-3.
The All Blacks in Australia did not do as well as expected, and the forwards, especially the locking, were the concern. Team manager Alf Bailey, the 1893 All Black who was also one of the national selectors, successfully insisted when returning to New Zealand that Cunningham be added to the side. Just how sensible that change was could be seen from the fact that Cunningham played the first 14 matches of the tour.
Newton played more often as a loose forward and did well enough to feature in three Tests on the tour. Cunningham played the Tests against England, Scotland and Ireland but missed the Wales Test.
The Sportsman said he was responsible for coaching the forwards throughout the tour, an achievement that guaranteed him a place in 'football posterity'.
Of the tour's teammates and opponents, he rated Billy Wallace as the top fullback among all those the side encountered, but Bert Winfield of Wales was a contender. Winfield was a class sportsman; he was also in the first Wales golf team. Wallace also featured in Cunningham's ideal three-quarter line of George Smith, Basil McLear of Ireland and Gwyn Nicholls of Wales, Winfield's brother-in-law and business partner.
"Cunningham confined himself to one in discussing five-eighths, W. Stead (New Zealand). Of halfbacks he had highest opinions of F. [Fred] Roberts (New Zealand), but the Welsh pair 'Dicky' Owen and Tommy Vile were not much inferior to the redoubtable Wellingtonian."[1]
With his familiarity with forward play, he said Charlie Seeling was the best of all the forwards he saw. He rated Tom Cross, who played for New Zealand between 1901-05, and for Canterbury and Wellington, as a player who never received full credit for his ability. Cross later played eight Tests for the New Zealand league team. George Tyler was his choice as the hooker, while captains David Bedell-Sivwright of Scotland and Ellie Allen of Ireland were two impressive opponents.
After the tour, Cunningham returned to Waihi, where he occasionally appeared for Auckland. He moved permanently to Auckland and the Ponsonby Club in 1907 and was the only player to appear in every game on the All Blacks' 1907 tour to Australia.
In 1908, he helped Ponsonby to win the Auckland championship for the first time in 11 years, and he played four games against the Anglo-Welsh tourists of that year.
He toured Australia with Ponsonby in 1909 when the club claimed the notional championship of Australasia. They had 13 players selected for Auckland's touring team of that season. In 1910, he returned to Australia along with his old Originals teammate Billy Stead on the first tour by the New Zealand Māoris, as they were then known.
In 1911, Cunningham claimed the record for most years playing for Auckland, his 11 beating Ponsonby clubmate Albie Braund's 10 years. He extended that by another year before retiring, although his expertise was so valued that he was appointed coach of the 1913 Auckland side and was a selector in 1920.
Cunningham died suddenly from acute meningitis in Auckland in 1927. As Billy Stead recalled, it concluded three intuitions he had in 1904.
"Under the average height on a line-out, yet no man ever beat him, a genius in scrum, no need to tell him when to keep the ball or let it out. Am I wrong in saying that his death removes the greatest lock the Dominion ever possessed. He had three intuitions as far back as November 1904 [sic], that Wales would beat us, that war would occur between England and Germany within ten years, and that he would not live to get the old age pension. How lamentably true. How hard to write the innate qualities of this Nature's gentleman, a hard but clean player, respected and appreciated by opponents, and adored by his intimates."[2]
[1] The Sportsman, 18 July, 1913
[2] Billy Stead tribute, The Southland Times, 6 September 1927